Fanfiction Torture
by Emerald Tide
Summary: Rima works for fanfiction(dot)net and absolutely detests it. The website has ruined the SC cast's lives, along with so many friendships and romances. When she's informed she must work an extra day to cover all the new Rimahiko stories that have popped up, she goes to tell Nagihiko – and finds herself truly talking with him for the first time in years. Day-early birthday fic for FFn


**IMPORTANT NOTE: ****_Before you start spamming my inbox with flames, let me tell you that I AM NOT BASHING THIS WEBSITE_****. I'm bashing the terrible stories in this website. This website is awesome and amazing, and it is the only thing resembling a life that I have. Okay? But I'm just tired of seeing terrible stories all over the place, and plus it is officially FFn's birthday tomorrow (October 15, maybe 16 or 14 for some of you. I've given up on figuring out the time difference between the U.S. and other places. Today for me is October 14). So I decided now would be the perfect time to help the SC archive a little. (I know, I could have published this tomorrow, but I was afraid I wouldn't get the chance.)  
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**So yes, this kind of bashes a couple of types of fanfiction stories and a couple of fanfiction qualities, but THEY'RE NOT SPECIFIC. I will not mention names, or even traits. At all. (Hopefully.)**

**Without further ado, here's the story.**

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This paragraph is not part of the story. I know there are people who are physically and/or mentally incapable of reading bold letters unless explicitly commanded to do so, so this is your explicit command. READ IT.

Rima Mashiro thought her third free day of the week would start mediocre at worst, but she was wrong.

"You'll have to work an extra day next week. There's been a lot of Rimahiko fanfiction lately, and you won't be able to do them all in seven days, I'm afraid. You'll have to do eight. Then, for the rest of the week, which is six days, you'll get to rest."

"So," she muttered flatly, resignedly, her tightly-planned out mental schedule for today and next week slashed to bits with those few sentences. "I should have known. Messengers never bring good news."

"I'm sorry." The messenger disappeared.

She was supposed to be used to this, but her head was still bowed down in frustration as she told her mom she was going out, walked all the way to Nagihiko's residence (which, of course, had to be on the other side of the village), and knocked on the door. There was no reply. _Not here, huh?_ Of course he wouldn't be there – as far as she knew, every character who worked for fanfiction always made the most of their seven free days – but where could he be, then?

Vaguely, she thought of the time when Shugo Chara was still incomplete, where the week had seven days instead of fourteen, twenty-four hours a day instead of seventy-two, and they'd battled Easter, not knowing that every move was planned out by a bigger existence, for the entertainment of others in the "real world". She wished more than anything that the Shugo Chara series was still being continued. She wished more than anything to still be oblivious, to not know that X-Eggs didn't really exist, and to think that they were real people instead of mere characters, two-dimensional figures created by a manga team called Peach-Pit – Peach-Pit, of all things. What a ridiculous name.

She'd rather be dead – which characters who didn't work for fanfiction were – than have this kind of life, but it wasn't like she had a choice. If she committed suicide, she'd instantly be brought back to life again. And she couldn't refuse to do a fanfiction. If she did, her body would automatically move, and that was even worse than doing it herself.

But she wanted so badly to be free.

But she was trapped. She'd never be free, no matter what she did.

_Think of Amu and Ikuto,_ she told herself sternly. When compared to them, what she was going through was nothing. Being cheated of free days was normal for them – on a good week, they had two. Six for them would be _heaven_. And their stories weren't all full of fluff, either. Amu had lost her "virginity" at least three thousand times – maybe four. She didn't know. They weren't allowed to see each other on their seven work days, and on the seven free days where they hung out and had as much fun as possible, nobody wanted to talk about torture unless it was to receive comfort.

Because fanfiction was torture.

There were the good fanfiction. The fanfiction that actually made them in-character, the fanfiction that didn't involve any nudity, the fanfiction that – best of all – were simple fluff, with kissing being the most contact. But there were too many bad fanfiction for Rima to appreciate the good ones. Once, she'd finally begun to trust an author – and that same author had forced her into a lemon.

_Amu. Think of Amu._ And as if on cue, she peeked into a ramen shop and found Amu – _finally, _she'd gotten a free day – and Utau there, munching on ramen like it was a potion that could cure them of all their troubles. Utau never ate with Kukai anymore. In fact, they planned out their trips so they would never bump into each other no matter what. It wasn't that they hadn't liked each other – they had; they'd confessed in the actual series, where nothing was forced – it was that fanfiction had shattered their romance. Now, it was too awkward for them to even look at each other. They were now polite acquaintances at best.

It wasn't a surprise to anyone. The same thing had happened with Kairi and Yaya (there weren't many fanfiction about them, but really, one... well... _unmentionable_ fanfic had been all it took). And although Ikuto still loved Amu, the latter now treated the former like he had a contagious disease.

And there was Rima and Nagihiko.

She didn't know what had become of them. For some reason, they were better off than the rest, which was strange as they were the second-most popular couple in the archive. Once, they'd bumped into each other on a free day and actually managed to smile at each other. They didn't avoid each other blatantly, yet they weren't friends anymore. No, not even close. But what were they?

She shook those thoughts away. "Hey, Amu, Utau," she called, causing them to look up. All the Shugo Chara characters (with the exception of the couples, and a few other characters) had become much closer during this entire never-ending ordeal, and called each other by their first names. That was probably the only good thing about this.

Utau gave her a small grin and wiggled her fingers in reply, but Amu just let out a sigh. "Hi, Rima," she mumbled, and Rima's heart tugged at her painfully. This was what her best friend had been reduced to. Her skin was now pale, her once-lovely pink hair was limp, and there were bags under her dull amber-colored eyes.

"Bad week?" Something told Rima that Amu wouldn't hold back, as opposed to other days.

"Yeah. I got raped nonstop for at least an hour by Tadase, and that was in the first chapter of the first story, on the first day. It was awful. Of course the author had to draw everything out, so Ikuto saved me right when I was literally about to die from the pain. I _hate_ M-rated stories. The amount is going down a little, but the ones that are remaining are terrible." Amu and Tadase were part of the "few other characters" that hadn't become close. In fact, their relationship was probably the most brutally destroyed of all, surpassing even Amu and Ikuto's relationship, as Tadase was always cast as the villain in stories if at all. Luckily, he wasn't cast very much.

Out of courtesy, Utau stood up, picking up the ramen bowl, and said, "I'll go to a different table." The two girls smiled at her gratefully, knowing she understood this was a private conversation.

"Do you hate Ikuto?"

Amu shook her head. "Of course not! Why would I? It's not his fault."

"I mean, if he hadn't existed…"

"If he hadn't existed, the same thing would be happening with Tadase, and there'd be an OC to replace Ikuto. And he'd be another playboy one." There were a few OCs roaming around the Shugo Chara characters' city (which was provided by fanfiction), but they were almost never seen.

"Good point. Speaking of other characters, have you visited the Guardian Characters lately? I hate how they're in the same series as us, but they have to live apart from us, because of course, they're barely ever used in stories." Not that any of the human Shugo Chara characters would admit it, but they were actually quite jealous of the Guardian Characters, who were barely ever written about and only had to act about once every three months – and those weren't even GC-_centric_, so all they had to do was float around and watch their owners forcing out sappy words. Also, it was a lot easier for Rima to be jealous when she barely ever saw her "would-be self" anymore – maybe once every two weeks. Rima _loathed_ herself for hating Kusukusu, but she couldn't help it. Yet there was always a voice in her head that told her Amu was much worse off, and _she_ didn't avoid seeing her Guardian Characters nearly as much as Rima did.

"Yeah. Last week I actually had four free days, and I was so happy I decided to devote one of them to visiting them. You know, it's amazing how unchanged they are in comparison to us. Anyway, Ikuto has it a lot worse than me," Amu sighed, seemingly unwilling to give up the subject, painful as it was. "He has to… well… you know… with so many random girls he probably lost track on the first day, just so he can give off the impression of being a playboy. And there are about fifty girls for each fanfiction."

"Really?" Rima had thought Amu had it the worst.

"Yeah." She sighed, a little wistfully. "I wish I could talk to him again. But I just can't, you know? He leaves for Europe, then suddenly we're all whisked to a completely different place and told we're just made-up characters who have to work for a website full of authors that write sex scenes like two-year-olds, and that fanfics have been written about us for years and now we have to spend our first few months in this place acting them out nonstop. And then we girls lose our virginities within one month. I'm glad none of us were actually twelve or thirteen or eleven years old when it happened, though."

Rima needed to change the subject; she was too uncomfortable with this now. "Speaking of ages, what's the oldest age you ever were in a fanfiction? Mine was around ninety. I could barely move. I guess I'm a little glad we don't have to age here."

"Mine was actually only about forty, and if we don't age, we don't die." Amu's voice grew so soft Rima had to strain to hear her. "I wish we could die."

The blonde smiled at her sadly. "I do too."

"We all do."

They sat there in silence for a while, both pondering their words. Then, Amu asked, "Hey, Rima, did you want to order ramen or something? Why'd you come?"

"Oh!" Rima's eyes widened. "I forgot! I was supposed to tell Nagihiko we had to work an extra day! I was looking for him. Do you know where he is?"

Amu blinked. "I think he's with Kukai… playing soccer? I passed them on the field as I was coming here. But they might be gone now."

"Thanks!" Rima dashed out of the shop. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Utau move back to the chair she'd been before, and desperately hoped the violet-eyed girl could comfort Amu some more while she was out looking for Nagihiko.

In a few minutes, she passed the soccer field, and gave a relieved sigh as she saw two figures, one a blur of purple and the other a blur of brown, running after a soccer ball. "Hey!" she called.

They looked at her. "Oh, hey, Rima!" Kukai called. "What are you doing here?"

"I need to talk to Nagihiko!"

The old Kukai would have grinned, nudged said boy, and said teasingly, "Now imagine the best possible situation…" But now, he just nodded. "I'll practice by myself until you come back," he told Nagihiko.

He made his way towards Rima. "Yeah?"

She stared pointedly at the ground. It was too awkward. Why couldn't the messenger have told him, too? Why did _she_ have to be the one to tell him anything? Especially after that utterly humiliating, failed fanfic in which she'd slapped him at least a dozen times per chapter… "We have to work an extra day. There are a lot of Rimahiko stories being published and updated right now."

"Any good ones?"

Rima glanced at him in surprise. Why was he talking to her? Why didn't he say "okay" and be done with it? "First of all, there are a few where we're just there as minor characters, so we only watch the others act. We barely have to talk at all. There's one about my parents getting divorced. It's a one-shot, and it's terribly cliché, not to mention OOC, but at this point I couldn't care less. It's the one with the least interaction out of the Rimahiko bunch; there's a single kiss and nothing else. And there are no M-rated ones, which is absolutely great. But Amu will be involved in one, and she's the antagonist _again_, and she likes you, and you like me, and I think she tries to kill me or something… I wonder how she'll feel when she's informed of that. She's gone through enough already with Ikuto. And the one where I'm depressed and you try to bring me out of my depression is being updated. I'm not sure what the next chapter will be about, though. I hope I don't have to commit suicide and swallow those pills; I hate throwing up, especially when it's because someone's finger is down my throat. But I guess I will. There's another one that's mediocre, and we actually act kind of IC. It's just where a new enemy comes, and it's not Easter, and there's a new kind of corrupted egg. Luckily, there's an OC that pretty much steals the show, and it's mainly Ikuto and that OC as a pairing. We're only a minor pairing, so we're kind of safe. There's the one where I slapped you about a thousand times. That one's probably one of the worst for you. And there's also the cliché where you're a playboy and you're attracted to me. That's a new one, and the first chapter's just published. I guess we can both handle that for now, until the inevitable comes. There's the one where we have drunken sex and I become pregnant. The worst is already over for you, though, so that's not a big deal. I still have to give birth. That's definitely the worst story out of the bunch for me. There's a few that involve Plan Rimahiko; you know what that's all about. Just Amu, Yaya, and maybe Kukai, Utau, and Ikuto getting us together. Never Tadase and Kairi, because they barely ever even get mentioned in stories. There are three where Amu's Guardian Eggs get smashed in a battle, and the Guardians – including us – betray her, and she moves to France and comes back a couple years later completely changed. And of course, there are about ten where you cross-dress and I find out about it, and I blackmail you, and –" She noticed that Nagihiko was staring at her, and flushed. "I'm ranting, aren't I?"

"Don't worry. I'd actually like to know what fanfics I'm up against before I actually act them out. Go on."

So she went on, slowly getting into her complaining, and finished after about thirty minutes with, "And that's the last one we'll have to do that week. The last twenty-five are all for that extra day. Where everyone else will be resting except Amu, Ikuto, Tadase, and us," she muttered bitterly.

Nagihiko watched her in surprise. "Are you crying?"

That did it. "I hate fanfiction," she burst out. "I hate it."

Was he going to have to comfort her like he'd done before in all that said fanfiction? "What happened?"

So she explained how she'd talked with Amu while looking for him. "Amu's changed. So much. When we were fighting Easter, she was always optimistic and determined to help everyone restore their dreams, no matter what. Look at her now. She's given up, and it's that stupid website's fault. She's accepted her fate, and I can't accept that. She doesn't even care anymore. For all it's worth, her life is already over. She's not the Amu Peach-Pit made her into, and she's not the Amu that became my friend. She gets the worst of it, and it's not fair. I wish I could trade places with her for just a week, so she could spend fourteen days being just a little bit happier than she is right now."

After a pause, Nagihiko replied hesitantly, "I don't know what to say to that."

"But don't you think Amu's changed?"

"I spend all my time with Kukai now. There isn't much Kutau fanfiction now, because the ones that star Kukai are mostly Kukamu, and those aren't even that bad, so he's kind of like my lifeline," he admitted. "He's barely depressed at all. He's probably the least changed out of everyone, and I don't want to be reminded of fanfiction on my free days."

Rima took a deep breath. "You hate fanfiction, right?"

"Of course. We all do. But look on the bright side. There are entertaining stories, right?"

"Yeah… if only there were more stories where we acted normal, and not so OOC, and fewer stories involving mushy words and way too much drama, then it might actually be enjoyable acting for these authors. Especially since we only act as much as we take breaks. But it's terrible right now."

Nagihiko shrugged. "It's not our choice whether the stories are good or not. We'll just have to hope the authors improve."

"Are you kidding? The archive has been going nowhere but downhill now."

"Well, I guess we could send a message to them, maybe? I mean, if fanfiction can send messengers to us, we can send messages to them, right?"

"When? When we act our fanfiction out?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, I guess. It's worth a try. I need to go. My schedule is messed up enough as it is." And Rima left, a lot happier than when she came, knowing maybe, just maybe, the website would improve just a little with their message. Why hadn't she thought of this before?

So they sent the message, asking for more sensible fanfiction. Fanfiction decided to honor their plea and send the message to a certain girl, penname Emerald Tide, in the form of a deranged plot bunny. As a result, Emerald Tide published this fanfiction, hoping that it would make a difference (even a small one) in the quality of this website.

The moral of this story is: Please, _think before you publish_. Think, "Would (insert character here) actually do these things?" And then try to imagine the character – the actual manga/anime character, with the actual physical features of that character, not just some random, idealized, hot/cute person you gave the character's name to – carry this act out. (For example, if you write a one-shot and make Rima sob, "Nagihiko, I love you! I've loved you ever since preschool, when we were still in diapers and much too young to understand the concept of love! I just pretended to hate you because I was embarrassed!" into his shirt and make Nagi go, "OMG I love you too! Oh, my darling sweetheart, my dear little creampuff! Here's a diamond ring!", then at least tell us why the heck they love each other. Make them list certain qualities, or else I will barf all over the computer screen. And this also pertains to OOC-ness: DO NOT EVER MAKE RIMA CRY INTO NAGI'S SHIRT. THAT IS JUST DISGUSTING, BOTH TO MYSELF AND RIMA. SHE WOULD NEVER RESORT TO SUCH CRUDE BEHAVIOR, NO MATTER HOW SAD SHE IS. SHE IS NOT SOME DAMSEL-IN-DISTRESS TYPE OF LITTLE PRINCESS THAT NEEDS A GUY LIKE NAGIHIKO TO RESCUE HER FROM HER DEPRESSION, WHICH ALSO HAPPENS TO BE NONEXISTENT.)

Or, "Does this even make logical sense? Would it happen in the real world?" (For example, if you want to make all the SC characters go on a trip to Hawaii for a year, at least give them fair warning, explain what they're doing there, and DON'T make their parents instantly agree to it, because they won't. If you just make Nikaidou go, "Okay, you're going to Hawaii for a year because I feel like randomly squishing you guys all together!" and then make the characters reply, "Huh? Really? OMG! Well, guess I'd better go pack!" and then, when they're at home, make the parents reply, "Okay, I don't even care what you're doing there, but have fun! I'll miss you!" then… well, that is NOT a believable scene.) Edit your chapter for plotholes or OOC-ness. Reread it over and over again. And Emerald Tide is in no position to say this (because her stories have millions of plotholes and are so OOC at certain places the characters are barely recognizable), but… if you do, it would benefit the SC characters A LOT. It would make their lives much, much easier. (And it will make more people read your story.)

You might even revive Amu again, and make her the bright, hopeful, smiling girl she once was.

Thanks for reading this.

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**Well… this is certainly different from what I usually publish, and… it's certainly not how I expected it to turn out. I actually just planned to write out a list of all the stories I detest, instead of creating a world where manga/anime characters have to work for fanfiction… until I realized that (the list, not the world) was against the rules. But who cares, I like it better this way.**

**I meant everything I said in this story. The awfulness of the archive is getting OUT OF HAND. When I first stumbled into the world of Shugo Chara fanfiction, the stories were AMAZING. What happened to that? (Although again, I am in absolutely no position to be saying this.)**

**That huge hard-to-read paragraph was on purpose, by the way, to emphasize that Rima was totally ranting and being OOC, because as I said before, all my stories are crazy OOC. This is probably the most IC story I've ever written. Also, it was full of the stories I hate. Just imagine it as me ranting.**

**Funny, I just realized that this also happens to be the story where I'm most entitled to make my characters OOC, because they're in a completely different world and have been tortured for years. Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh.**

**Bye, and please review!**

**P.S. I've noticed that I use the phrase "Rima left" a lot in my stories. I wonder why. Just a random thought.**


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